It happened that during the campaign Mr. Clay and I stopped at a little hostelry, that lay in the very centre of one of Mr. Cobb’s strongest counties. It was little more than a flower-embowered cottage, kept by “Aunt Hannah,” a kindly soul, whose greatest treasure was a fresh-faced, pretty daughter, then entering her “teens.” I returned to our room after a short absence, just in time to see this village beauty before my mirror, arrayed in all the glory of a beautiful and picturesque hat which I had left upon the bed during my absence. It was a lovely thing of the period, which I had but recently brought back from the North, having purchased it while en route for Doctor Wesselhœft’s Hydropathic Institute in Brattleboro, Vermont.
The little rustic girl of Alabama looked very winsome and blossomy in the pretty gew-gaw, and I asked her impulsively if she liked it. Her confusion was sufficient answer, and I promptly presented it to her, on condition that she would give me her sunbonnet in return.
The exchange was quickly made, and when Mr. Clay and I departed I wore a pea-green cambric bonnet, lined with pink and stiffened with pasteboard slats. I little dreamed that this exchange of millinery, so unpremeditated, and certainly uncalculating, was a political master-stroke; but, so it proved. It undermined Mr. Cobb’s Gibraltar; for at the election that followed, the vote in that county was practically solid for Mr. Clay, where formerly Mr. Cobb had swept it clean.
When, upon the train en route for the capital in the winter of ’53, Senator Fitzpatrick insisted upon presenting the erstwhile triumphant politician, I took the long, flail-like hand he offered me with no accentuated cordiality; my reserve, however, seemed not to disturb Mr. Cobb’s proverbial complacency.
“I’ve got a crow to pick with you, Mrs. Clay,” he began, “for that pink bonnet trick at old Aunt Hannah’s!”
“And I have a buzzard to pick with you!” I responded promptly, “for defeating my husband!”
“You ought to feel obliged to me,” retorted the Congressman, continuing “For I made your husband a Senator!”
“Well,” I rejoined, “I’ll promise not to repeat the bonnet business, if you’ll give me your word never again to sing against my husband! That’s unfair, for you know he can’t sing!” which, amid the laughter of our fellow-passengers, Mr. Cobb promised.
Our entrance into the Federal City was not without its humorous side. We arrived in the early morning, about two o’clock, driving up to the National Hotel, where, owing to a mistake on the part of the night-clerk, an incident occurred with which for many a day I twitted my husband and our male companions on that eventful occasion.
At that period it was the almost universal custom for Southern gentlemen to wear soft felt hats, and the fashion was invariable when travelling. In winter, too, long-distance voyagers as commonly wrapped themselves in the blanket shawl, which was thrown around the shoulders in picturesque fashion and was certainly comfortable, if not strictly à la mode. My husband and the other gentlemen of our party were so provided on our journey northward, and upon our arrival, it must be admitted, none in that travel-stained and weary company would have been mistaken for a Washington exquisite of the period.